Excerpts from “State of Human Rights in 2009”

---Human Rights Commission of Pakistan

Introduction

Dastardly terrorist attacks, resulting in the killing of innocent citizens and law-enforcement personnel across the country, throughout the year 2009, constituted the greatest threat to fundamental rights of the citizens. Coming under attack from the security forces in their bastions in Swat and South Waziristan, the militant groups became desperate; they did not spare mosques, bazaars, religious minorities and educational institutions in their obvious bid to paralyse the state and all civilian life. The acts of terrorism and the state’s response to it are discussed in the chapter on Law and order.
………

The sad fact, however, was that the parliament did not pay adequate attention to the vital issues, quite a few of which affected national security, except for an initiative it took to address the uprising in Balochistan towards the end of the year. However, the so-called relief package, too, was yet to be implemented. The matters related to militancy and IDPs drew little attention from the law-makers. During the entire year, they did little law-making, passing only four acts while most of the legislation was done through Presidential ordinances. [See the chapters on ‘Laws and Law-making’ and ‘Political participation’]

The parliament and the executive also failed to take notice of the issues causing distress to the masses, allowing the superior judiciary to expand its jurisdiction and pass verdicts on a variety of subjects, such as determination of the prices of sugar and petrol etc. The Judiciary, on its part, was found short on its promises of expeditious disposal of cases and eradication of corruption in the judicial system. More than 1.5 million cases were pending in the courts at the end of 2009. The chapter on ‘Administration of Justice’ provides details.

In fact, the administration of justice required more than additional judges in courts and higher salaries for the judges. The other two organs of the justice system, police and jails, also needed to be overhauled. Jails were over-crowded and poorly administered. The police was short of personnel. It was also thoroughly corrupt and poorly trained. To check the crime rate, it relied on shortcuts like extra legal killings of the accused in the so-called encounters.……

An outright disrespect for fundamental rights, both by the state and the communal elements, was also visible in the crimes and excesses perpetrated against religious minorities. While the gangsters went on rampage in Gojra against Christians and in Karachi against Shias and looted or destroyed the properties of innocent businessmen, the police force apparently looked the other way. A factory-owner in Muridke was brutally murdered by a mob in the presence of policemen who stood by helplessly. This is obviously due to a lack of professionalism in the police force and absence of an effective institutional mechanism to supervise its functioning, which could ensure public safety and protection of fundamental rights of the citizens.

The Gojra and Muridke incidents, and dozens of cases implicating Ahmedis, also highlighted the misuse of the blasphemy laws, which over the years have been exploited by fanatics and vested interests to perpetuate a reign of terror against the minorities. The government was again too timid to take on the obscurantist elements and make amendments in the law. It could not even enforce the law banning the misuse of loudspeakers that the miscreants employed with impunity to incite the people to violence in both the gory incidents.

The state’s abdication of its responsibilities towards the welfare of the masses could be seen in areas of social and human development. At the end of the year under review, more than 3.5 million children were working as labour in the country in sheer violation of the law and the Constitution. The chapters on Education, Children and Labour provide the details. Public education sector stood ruined as a result of neglect over past several decades. The government did not even care to regulate the private sector schools in order to bring them under some regulatory framework. The same was the state of public healthcare, public transport and housing for the low-income groups. In Punjab, the alleged instances of neglect by private hospitals in providing treatment to patients triggered public protest, but the provincial assembly did not even discuss this issue of public concern.

In recent years, environmental degradation emerged as an issue of survival for Pakistanis, especially owing to acute water shortage, but no serious longterm planning was in sight. The year 2009 witnessed mass protests on the shortage of electricity and natural gas and the emerging trend indicated that in the coming years the people could be up in arms on the issue of water shortage if this issue was not tackled on time.

The media, despite all its shortcomings, played a major role in raising the issues of public interest and highlighted the lackadaisical performance of the government. In doing so, it earned the ire of the rulers. The politicians, who had benefitted from the media in the past during the harsh military regimes, found it hard to stomach its criticism. The media remained under attack from both the state and non-state actors and faced restrictions on free reporting in Balochistan and the tribal region. [The chapter on ‘Freedom of expression’ gives the details]

These issues of public interest on 18 different subjects were monitored and documented by HRCP all along the year as per its tradition since 1990. This book provides an overview of the human rights situation in 2009 besides a digest of the commission.s activities and stands during this period.

Adnan Adil
Editor

Highlights

• Freedom of thought, conscience and religion
• The year 2009 saw increasing frequency of organised violent attacks on religious minorities while the government failed to take proactive measures to prevent such violence in Gojra and Karachi.
• More than 41 complaints of blasphemy were reported during the year.
• At least five members of the Ahmadi sect were murdered in target killings in 2009, raising to 100 the number of killings since the introduction of anti-Ahmadiyya laws by the Ziaul Haq government in 1984.
• In 2009, 15 incidents of sectarian violence took place in Balochistan in which 26 men were killed and two others injured.
• As the militancy surged in the northwestern parts of the country, enforced migration and displacement of thousands of people belonging to Christians, Sikhs and Hindu communities from Swat, Kohat and FATA was reported following threats by Islamist elements.
• A majority of Hindu women did not possess CNIC cards because of legal complications in registration of marriages.
• 37 Ahmadis were booked under the blasphemy laws during the year and fifty-seven Ahmadis were charged under Ahmadi-specific laws.
• Nearly 80 per cent of the minority population falls below the poverty line and it has usually been ignored during the various government support programmes.

Administration of justice

Promotion of Ahmedi officer

Shaukat Ali Wahla, an Ahmedi employed at the Auqaf Department, was promoted as superintendent in BPS 16. In August 1996, the order of his promotion was recalled on the ground that the Punjab Waqf properties Ordinance did not allow the promotion of a non-Muslim as an officer. Wahla came to the Lahore High Court and it granted him relief on the ground that he had been penalised without being heard. Following the Court judgement, the Auqaf Department withdrew its impugned order and promoted Wahla to BPS 17 and also allowed him selection grade. In 2001, the department again started proceedings against him and to meet the requirement of giving him a hearing, issued him a show cause notice. In January 2002, the Department held that Wahla.s promotion as Superintendent was illegal and the order of his promotion was withdrawn. Wahla again appealed to the Lahore High Court and the court again held the order of the department illegal. In 2009, LHC held the recall illegal saying discrimination on the basis of religion was against Article 27(1) of the Constitution. Auqaf Department moved the SC against the LHC judgement.

Fundamental freedoms
Freedom of thought, conscience and religion

… It is the will of the people of Pakistan to establish an order … wherein shall be guaranteed fundamental rights, including equality of status, of opportunity and before law, social, economic and political justice, and freedom of thought, expression, belief, faith, worship and association, subject to law and public morality
Constitution of Pakistan
Preamble

Subject to law, public order and morality (a) every citizen shall have the right to profess, practise and propagate his religion; and (b) every religious denomination and every sect thereof shall have the right to establish, maintain and manage its religious institutions.
Article 20

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. They are endowed with reason and conscience and should act towards one another in a spirit of brotherhood.
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Article 1

Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief, and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief in teaching, practice, worship and observance.
Article 18

No one shall be subject to coercion which would impair his freedom to have a religion or belief of his choice.

No one shall be subject to discrimination by any state, institution, group of persons, or person on the grounds of religion or other belief.

UN Declaration on the Elimination of All Forms of
Intolerance and of Discrimination Based on Religion or Belief
Articles 1(2) and 2(1)

In an xenophobic atmosphere, created and promoted by conservative clerics and a section of the media religious minorities are viewed with suspicion and mistrust. They are seen as constantly conspiring against Islam, Muslims and Pakistan in cahoot with the infidel foreign powers, especially the West. An imaginary combine of Hunud-o-Yahud-o-Nasara (Hindus, Jews and Christians) is supposed to be conspiring against Pakistani Muslims all the time in collaboration with the local minorities. This world view propagated on a large scale, coupled with an unfavourable legal regime, has made life difficult for the non-Muslim citizens. They cannot freely practise their religion and present their point of view without risking their life, honour and property as is evident from attacks on them.

The year 2009 saw an increase in violent attacks on religious minorities while the government failed to take effective preventive measures. The growing intolerance of religious minorities. rights, increased frequency of vigilante actions against them and attacks on non-Muslims over allegations of blasphemy and desecration of religious scriptures caused serious hardships to them. As the Pakistan army and paramilitary forces conducted military operations against the Taliban networks in Swat and other tribal areas including South Waziristan, the militants struck with vengeance, in other parts of the country, at non-Muslim minorities, as well as the Muslim minority Shia sect.

The systematic manner in which the Christian colony in Gojra and the shops in Bolton Market in Karachi were burnt down indicated the involvement of organized and trained militants. It was widely believed that indigenous militant organizations (already banned) were behind these attacks. That these organizations had close connections with the Taliban militants and al-Qeada was no secret. The role of main religio-political parties was mostly inimical to religious minorities. These parties did not condemn the violence against the minorities and often advanced conspiracy theories about foreign hands being behind violence against minorities. In some cases, the seminaries closely connected with religio-political parties were used to foment trouble against the minority communities. On the other hand, the government response, mostly in the form of belated announcements of financial compensation and some attempts at encouraging reconciliation at the local level, had usually been insufficient and reactive.

Freedom of Religion

Ahmadis

As the most vulnerable community in Pakistan the Ahmadis continued to face discrimination and violence throughout the year. The blasphemy laws were widely used against them as five Ahmedi citizens were murdered in target killings in 2009, raising to 100 their casualties since the introduction of anti-Ahmadiya laws by the Ziaul Haq regime in 1984.

Cases on religious grounds and blasphemy victims

The blasphemy law proved to be a major contributor to the minorities. woes during the year as the Gojra carnage demonstrated. In 2009, a total of 41 complaints of blasphemy were registered by police. Some 37 Ahmedis were booked under blasphemy laws and 57 Ahmedis were charged under Ahmedi-specific laws. However, many cases were registered against Muslims as the rival sects of Islam increasingly used the blasphemy law against each other, as may be seen in the account given below:

January 2: The Sargodha police booked two men, Mushtaq Ahmed and Muhammad Ali, on the charges of erasing kalma from the wall of a village mosque.

January 12: A man named Liaquat, was arrested by the police for allegedly burning the Quran in Panwan village near Manawala, Sheikhupura district.

January 17: Chichawatni police booked two men, Pir Syed Athar Shah Naqvi and Syed Ismail Shah, on the charge of committing blasphemy in their speeches on the occasion of the birth anniversary of Hazrat Ali. A cleric belonging to Sunni-Deobandi sect, Mufti Muhammad Usman, had filed a complaint against the two men belonging to the Sunni-Barelvi sect. Two days later, the workers of Jamaat Ahle Sunnat and the Anjuman Tajiran Chichawatni staged a protest demonstration outside the office of the district police officer in Sahiwal against wrongly implicating Pir Athar Shah. The sessions judge at Khanewal dismissed the bail application of the accused and the police arrested one of them.

January 19: A petition was moved in the Lahore High Court against Qurban Ali, the principal of a private education trust in Lahore, for allegedly committing blasphemy by writing a book, titled ‘Hero and Role Model’ in which he listed his six top heroes of the world including Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and himself. Muhammad Younas, Khateeb at a mosque moved the police for the registration of a case. On 18 February, an additional sessions judge, ordered police to register a case against the accused on blasphemy charges.

January 28: Five Ahmedis, including four children, were charged with blasphemy under section 295-C in Chak 172-TDA, in Layyah district. However, the police foiled an attempt by the members of a banned organisation to torch the houses of the people belonging to the Ahmediya community. The four children remained behind the bars for six months.

January 30: Businesses were closed down and protest demonstrations were staged in Mandi Bhauddin (Punjab) against the alleged defiling of the Quran a day earlier.

January 31: Ahsan Tahami, a librarian at the Quaid-e-Azam Library, Lahore, was booked for uttering blasphemous words in a discussion. He fled his home along with his family and went into hiding.

February 5: Muntazirul Haq Shahjehan, a police officer and station house officer (SHO) at Raja Jang police station, was booked on blasphemy charges on the complaint of a local journalist.

February 6: Several political and religious parties staged a demonstration in Quetta against alleged desecration of Holy Quran in Zhob and urged the government to probe the incident.

February 9: Muazaffarabd police registered a case against the sellers of a book allegedly containing blasphemy material. The accused got pre-arrest bail from a court.

February 16: The District and Sessions Judge, Jhelum, heard a case relating to blasphemy charges against one, Khalid Naqash, who had written a book titled, ‘Quran aur Hum’. It was alleged that the book contained blasphemous content about Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). Another man, Muhammad Afzal, who had written the preamble of the book, was also arrested along with the author.

February 18: Clerics in Raiwind called upon the government to register a case and punish those responsible for alleged desecration of Holy Quran in a private hospital at Syeda Waheeda Memorial Nursing College, Raiwind Road Lahore, run by Fatima Memorial Hospital Lahore. It was alleged that some Christian students had placed Quran in shoe boxes. As the clerics protest mounted, the college administration closed down the institution for fear of unrest and violence.

March 1: The Kasur police arrested two Christian men, Wilayat Masih and Mushtaq Masih, on blasphemy charges in Malloki village. The accused were charged that they had covered the grave of a Christian relative with a cloth inscribed with Quranic verses.

March 11: Police booked 25 people on blasphemy charges and arrested four of them in Chak 33 in Kanganpur area, Kasur district. The accused belonged to Ahl-e-Hadith sect and the complainant to Sunni-Barelvi sect.

March 12: Police registered a case under section 295 and 295-A of the PPC against unidentified people for writing blasphemous words on street walls of Umerkot and Mirwah Gorchani on March 10. Hundreds of people protested against the alleged blasphemy, attacked petrol pumps and shops and blocked main highways.

March 23: Police booked four Muslim men for attacking a religious congregation of a different sect and allegedly uttering blasphemous words against Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) in Pattoki, Kasur district. Two of the accused, Rana Naeem and Rana Zahoor, were arrested.

March 27: One Irfan was arrested by the police on the charge of burning a Quran in Mohallah Sabri Colony, Okara.

April 4: Anees Mallah, (25) who was facing blasphemy charges, was found dead in Sanghar jail. He had been moved there only a day earlier from Mirpur Khas, where he had spent almost a year in prison. Anees’s lawyer said he was subjected to torture, shot and afterwards slaughtered brutally in the jail by some jail inmates. His elder brother, Ghulam Rasool Mallah, said Anees was wrongly implicated in a blasphemy case in March 2008 and murdered inside the jail. He said even medico-legal officers were afraid to issue a report about the cause of the death. He said on March 21 2008, his brother’s motorbike had crashed into a gate erected for a Milad function which angered the organisers and they implicated him in a blasphemy case.

April 7: Lahore High Court’s Bahawalpur bench rejected a bail plea of Haider Zaman, accused of blasphemy, and sent him to prison. A mob of baton-wielding students of local seminaries surrounded the court during the hearing and chanted slogans asking the court to award death sentence to the accused. Afterwards, on 30 June, a threemember bench of the Supreme Court also rejected his bail plea and ordered the Bahawalnagar trial court to complete the hearing within three months.

April 8: Police registered a case against a Muslim woman, Ameera Bibi, on blasphemy charges, under sections 290-A and 295-C of PPC, on the direction of a court in Chowk Azam, Layyah district for saying derogatory remarks against God and Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). A local man, Shabbir Shah, was the complainant.

April 10: An additional district and sessions judge at Kamalia (Punjab) ordered the city police to register a case against two Shia clerics, Imran Rizvi and Asif Raza Alvi, on blasphemy charges on the complaint of clerics from a rival Sunni sect.

April 13: Police booked and arrested Bilal Tahir Khawaja, owner of a football manufacturing factory, on blasphemy charge under section 295-A for printing holy Islamic names on footballs. No lawyer represented the accused in the court as Daska lawyers association assured the complainant clerics that the bar would not provide legal assistance to the accused.

April 14: Clerics belonging to Tehreek-e-Tahfuzz-e-Namoos-e-Risalat (Movement for the protection of sanctity of Prophet (PBUH), moved Lahore High Court to get a blasphemy case registered against the owner of a textile mills in Faisalabad. The petitioners alleged the factory had printed the name of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) on bed sheets and thus committed blasphemy.

April 21: The Supreme Court (Shariat Appellate Bench) rejected an appeal against a Federal Shariat Court (FSC) ruling that death is the only punishment that the Islamic law provides for blasphemy. The appeal had been filed by Bishop Dani L. Tasleem 18 years ago after the FSC gave the judgment in exercise of its powers to determine if the existing laws conformed to Sharia. The appellant could not pursue the petition as he had died.

April 25: Twelve Christian families in Chak 190/AL village of Sahiwal left their homes in a bid to save their lives on receiving life threats from other Christians and Muslims — who alleged that these families had committed blasphemy by throwing ink on the Holy Quran. The village had a huge Christian population. Unidentified people had broken into Harappa Government Community Model Girls Primary School in the village. In the morning, students found on the ground a page of the Holy Quran smeared with black ink and gum. The words on the blackboard led to the assumption that a Christian was responsible for what had happened.

May 9: The Pasrur Police registered a case against a Shia cleric who was accused of saying something derogatory about the companions of the Prophet (PBUH) during a speech.

May 30: A mob staged a protest demonstration in Sukkur against a doctor belonging to Hindu faith. A medical representative, Asghar Channa, complained that assistant professor Pawan Kumar of Ghulam Muhammad Medical College had allegedly uttered blasphemous words against Prophet Muhammad (PBUH). The protesters dispersed after the police assured them that a case would be registered against the accused. Afterwards, the police registered a case on blasphemy charges against him. On 23 June, a Sukkur magistrate ordered the police to present the challan against the accused.

June 27: Bashir Ahmed, imprisoned in Dera Ghazi Khan Jail and facing trial on the charges of saying disrespectful words against the companions of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH), was slaughtered by another prisoner with a sharp razor inside the jail.

July 1: A young man, Imran Masih, was captured by a mob and tortured on the charge of burning the Quran and Islamic books in Faisalabad. Police arrested the man and registered a case against him.

July 9: The Talagang police in Chakwal district registered a case on blasphemy charges, under sections 295-A and 295-C, against a man, Pir Muhammad Ishaq, who allegedly claimed to be God and Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

July 18: FIA Karachi arrested a man, Murad, resident of Gizri, on the complaint of journalist Ansar Abbasi who allegedly received hate mails from him. The accused was also charged with publishing blasphemous material against Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) on a website.

July 26: Workers belonging to Sunni Tehreek staged a protest demonstration and blocked the main Sheikhupura highway in Khararianwala area in Faisalabad district to pressurise the local police for registering a case against 32 Ahmedis, of 194 RB village, on the charge of writing Quranic verses on the outer walls of their houses. The Police registered a case under sections 295-A and 295-C.

July 27: The Sambrial police registered a case under section 295-B, against a man named Maqsood Ahmed, on the charges of desecrating the Quran in Chak Ikhtiar near Sambrial in Sialkot district. The next day, a civil judge sent the accused on 14-day judicial remand.

July 28: Police arrested a man, Amir Haider, on the charge of sending a message allegedly derogatory against the companions of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH).

August 5: A mob surrounded the house of a middle aged woman, Akhtari Malkani, in a katchi abadi in Sanghar, Sindh on the charge that she had desecrated the Quran. Police took the woman into custody to save her from the mob and assured protesters that if evidence was found it would register a case against her. Angry protesters, demanding the custody of the woman, threw stones at the police station and burnt tyres on the road. Police shot in the air to disperse the crowd. Afterwards, the complainant, Siddique Arain, a shopkeeper, who had some monetary dispute with the accused, disappeared when the police contacted him to file a complaint against Ms Malkani. The woman told the police she had thrown an account book on the ground, not the Quran as the complainant initially accused her, provoking the protests. A 10 member committee headed by the Sanghar Taluka Nazim, absolved the woman of the blasphemy charge after initial investigation and interviews with the witnesses.

September 4: A couple was booked and arrested in Jamber village in Phoolnagar, Kasur district, on the charge of declaring their 10-month-old son Imam Mehdi. More than 500 villagers protested against Abdullah and his wife, Shazia, and blocked the main highway demanding a blasphemy case be registered under 295-C against them.

September 11: A mob torched a local Catholic church in Jaithikey-Sambrial, in Sambrial Tehsil of Daska district over alleged desecration of the Holy Quran in the village. A Christian young man, Robert Fanish Masih, 25, was accused of snatching a chapter of the Holy Quran from a local girl and throwing it into a drain. After the alleged incident, local Muslims armed with bricks, stones and sticks attacked the church. They set it ablaze by sprinkling petrol and kerosene oil on it. As no person was present in the church, no casualty took place. Meanwhile, the agitators led by local clerics took out rallies demanding immediate arrest of the accused persons. All the shops and markets remained closed in the village and its surrounding areas while thousands of scared villagers locked themselves up in their homes. The Christian community left the troubled area immediately to save their lives. One day later, the police arrested the accused who was found dead on 15 September in Sialkot Jail. When his family took his body for burial in the native village, a mob attacked the funeral procession, snatched the body and dragged it on the road. He was finally buried in Sialkot district.

October 30: Police registered a blasphemy case against Qaisar Ali Haideri, the author of a book, on the complaint of Mumtaz Ahmed Dar in Kotla Arab Ali, Gujrat district. On 11 November, hundreds of people brought out a procession against the police for not arresting the accused.

November 1: Police arrested a man, Sadiq Abbas, and registered a case against him on the charge of burning dozens of copies of Quran in a mosque in Chak 302 JB, Noorpur in Toba Tek Singh district.

November 11: Gojra Additional District and Sessions Judge handed down death sentence and fined Rs100,000 to a blasphemy accused, Muhammad Aslam of Shahabad Colony, on the charge of using blasphemous language publicly on Oct 5, 2008. The court allowed the convict to file an appeal against the sentence before the Lahore High Court within a week.

Damages to and acquisition of places of worship

……
In June, an Ahmediya graveyard in Pir Mahal, Toba Tek Singh, was attacked and desecrated by rioters following which the authorities cancelled the land allotment order issued to the Ahmedis 20 years ago.

During 2009, in Lahore, Ahmedi worship places in Model Town repeatedly received threats from the conservative religious groups and hate campaigns were conducted against the community through wall-chalking, posters and pamphlets.

Violence against Ahmedis

January 19: An Ahmedi, Saeed Ahmad, was killed in Kotri (Sindh).

February 20: Mubashir Ahmed was shot dead in Karachi.

February 25: A murder attempt was made on Muhammad Iqbal Abid, an Ahmedi religious teacher in Vehari.

March 14: Shiraz Bajwa and his wife Noreen Bajwa, both doctors, were brutally murdered in Multan.

April 1: Bashir Ahmed, Advocate, President of the local Ahmadiyya community, Achini Payan, near Peshawar, was abducted and had not been recovered till Dec 31 2009.

May 8: A well known Ahmedi trader, Mian Laiq Ahmad, was attacked in Faisalabad by three armed men while sitting in his car. The armed men blocked the road to his house and shot him dead.

May 9: Rashid Karim, a well-known Ahmedi in Faisalabad, was abducted and released after five months on the payment of a heavy ransom.

June 24: Two Ahmedis, Khalid Rasheed and Zafar Iqbal, were shot dead in Quetta.

July 6: Rana Ata-ul-Karim was murdered in Multan.

August 6: An Ahmedi, Rana Ata-ul Karim, was shot dead after his wife was harassed by three Muslim extremists in Multan.

August 7: Two Ahmedis were assaulted for their faith in Nankana Sahab near Lahore.

August 12: Javed Ahmed escaped a murder attempt in Kunri (Sindh).

September 11: Zulfiquar Mansur was abducted in Quetta and a month later his dead body was found on the roadside on the city.s outskirts.

September 26: Ahmed Farooqi was shot dead in Uch Sharif, Bahawalpur.

November 25: Dr Pervaiz Zareef of Bhati Gate, Lahore narrowly escaped an attempt on his life.

November 26: Rana Saleem Ahmad, the Deputy Amir of Jamaat Ahmediya Sanghar, was shot at and killed.

Activities inciting religious intolerance were ignored rather than punished, often leading to serious consequences

Major incidents of violence against religious minorities

The Layyah incident

On January 28, a case under Section 295-C of the Penal Code was registered against five men belonging to the Ahmediya community at Kot Sultan police station of Layyah district where around half a dozen Ahmediya families lived.

Four of the accused were boys studying at matriculation level. They were accused of writing the name of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) on the walls of a mosque’s toilet in village 172/TDA. Although the accused denied the allegation made against them, they were arrested and detained. The fifth accused was a labourer.

According to the Human Rights Commission of Pakistan (HRCP) fact-finding mission sent to Layyah on February 1, 2009, a few days prior to the lodging of the FIR, a resident of Chak 173/TDA named Muhammad Safdar saw the name of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) written on the mosque’s toilet. He told the prayer leader, Qari Muhammad Saeed, about the writing. According to Masood Ahmed, representative of the Ahmadiyya community in Layyah, six Ahmadi families had been living in village 172/TDA for over 50 years and had had no dispute or enmity with any other community member.

The nazim of the area was asked to probe the matter. It was learnt that four students from the Ahmediya community, namely, Mohammad Irfan, Tahir Imran, Tahir Mehmood and Naseeb Ahmed, used to offer prayers in the mosque and also used its toilets. After the investigation, the Ahmedis were stopped from offering prayers in the mosque, and it was said the villagers believed that the Ahmedis, being the only non-Muslims coming to the mosque, must have committed the sacrilege.

After the registration of the case with the police, the Ahmediya community voluntarily handed over all those nominated in the FIR to the police. The students assured the authorities that they had not written the Prophet’s name in the mosque’s toilets nor had committed any other crime. The students told the authorities that their matriculation examination was due to begin on March 4 and requested to be released.

However, the accused were transferred from Kot Sultan police station, around 20 kilometers from the village, to Saddar police station in Layyah city. The HRCP team went to the police station and requested permission to talk to the accused, but the SHO turned down the request and said he was only responsible for the custody of the accused as it was not his police station.s case. However, the police and villagers conceded that there was no witness or evidence of the Ahmadis’ involvement in the alleged blasphemy and as required by law, no investigation was carried out by the SP investigation prior to the arrest of the accused. The bail applications of the boys were rejected quite a few times and they had to take their examination while in confinement. Eventually, they were granted bail after six months of their arrest.
……

Recommendations 

1. A transparent and fair investigation must be carried out soon after any attacks on minorities in order to enforce justice and ensure that innocent people are not victimized.
2. The prevailing blasphemy law is arbitrary and should be repealed. The allegations of blasphemy or defiling of religious scriptures, irrespective of their veracity, do not warrant vigilante attacks. Nor do they absolve the government of its primary duty to protect all citizens. Effective prosecution of offenders would serve as a deterrent to future attacks, while a lack of it would encourage impunity. The federal government must take action to ensure that laws on the statute books are not abused to harass or ostracize citizens.
3. Workshops should be held for school teachers and administrators to sensitise them to the issue of religious tolerance as they play a key role in building the school.s atmosphere and exercise considerable influence over their pupils. The government should adopt a policy of promoting extra-curricular activities to promote religious understanding and tolerance in schools. For example, Muslim students may be taken to places of worship of other religions like churches and temples to familiarize themselves with religious practices and customs of minority groups.
4. A strict check must be kept on the dissemination of literature and audio-visual material promoting hatred against any religious communities or sects.
5. Special steps are needed to check the persecution of Ahmadis.

Appendix - II
HRCP stands

Freedom of belief and religion

February 12: Five Ahmadis detained on charges of blasphemy in Layyah district have been held virtually without any proof or witnesses, HRCP has said.

The commission, which had sent a fact-finding team to Layyah district last week, said its findings concluded that an investigation, mandated by law prior to the registration of a blasphemy case, was also not held.

The HRCP team learned that a prayer leader in the village had allowed Ahmadi students from a nearby tuition centre to offer prayers in his mosque. The students were later threatened by a government schoolteacher and never went to the mosque again. Around 10 days later, some villagers claimed finding blasphemous writings in the mosque’s toilet.

In the First Information Report (FIR), the complainant said: “Since these Ahmadis are the only non-Muslims coming to the mosque, therefore they must have committed the offence”. The ‘argument’ was heard time and again during the HRCP team’s interviews with the mosque administration, some villagers and the local police.

The police and villagers conceded that there were no witnesses or evidence of the Ahmadis’ involvement. The HRCP team found elements belonging to banned extremist organisations and a relative of the National Assembly member from the area had pressurised the police to register a case. “It is clear that a local politician has also used his influence” to book the Ahmadis, the Commission’s report said.

HRCP said the complainant and his extremist supporters are adamant that the Ahmadis should be punished on the basis of presumption.

HRCP has demanded a prompt and transparent investigation into the matter to ensure that innocent people are not victimised. It has also demanded the government ensure that the Ahmadiyya community in the village is not harassed or ostracised. The Commission has also asked the government to take prompt measures to rule out misuse of the blasphemy law.

Reviving Pakistan’s Pluralist Traditions to Fight Extremism

---The Heritage Foundation

ISSUES > Asia and the Pacific

May 4, 2009
Reviving Pakistan’s Pluralist Traditions to Fight Extremism
by Lisa Curtis

Pakistan is in the midst of rapid political shifts that are challenging the leadership’s ability to maintain cohesion within the country and even raising questions about Pakistan’s ability to survive as a viable nation-state over the next few years. Pakistan has long suffered from ethnic and sectarian divisions. However, the recent threat from a well-armed and well-organized Islamist insurgency pushing to establish strict Islamic law in the entire country, beginning with the North West Frontier Province (NWFP), adds a new and more dangerous dimension to the country’s challenges. Although the collapse of the Pakistani state may not be imminent, as some have recently argued, the government’s surrender of the Swat Valley is a major victory for Islamist extremists seeking to carve out pockets of influence within the country.

The establishment of a parallel Islamic courts system in the Malakand region of the NWFP (including Swat Valley) will have dire human rights consequences for average Pakistanis, especially women and girls. The pro-Taliban militants have already destroyed numerous girls’ schools and engaged in brutal public punishments to instill fear in the population and quell dissent from their harsh interpretation of Islam. In early April, Pakistani Chief Justice Iftikhar Ali Chaudhry raised several questions regarding a public flogging of a young woman in Swat. The flogging had been aired on Pakistan’s major media outlets, prompting many Pakistanis to express outrage over worsening human rights conditions in the region since the Taliban takeover.

The contrast between the Taliban “justice” and the justice that so many Pakistanis recently demanded in street protests is striking. Pakistanis were jubilant in March 2009 when Chief Justice Chaudhry was reinstated after he had been unconstitutionally removed two years ago by then-President Pervez Musharraf. Yet the independence of the judiciary that Pakistanis fought so hard to restore is again at risk–this time from terrorist violence and intimidation. Swat militant leader Sufi Mohammed’s recent criticism of the Pakistani Supreme Court and high courts for not operating under strict Sharia (Islamic law) reveals the militants’ broader goal of undermining Pakistan’s democratic institutions.

For Pakistan to fend off the growing extremist influence in the country, its leadership will need to do a better job of highlighting the brutality of the pro-Taliban militants. They need to demonstrate that the pro-Taliban insurgents are imposing a way of life on Pakistani citizens that is alien to their own traditions of Islam and aspirations toward constitutional democracy. This is Pakistan’s fight, but the U.S. can support those Pakistanis seeking to promote religious tolerance and pluralism and to develop a civil society and democratic institutions, including the parliament, judiciary, and free press.

Rise of Militancy Erodes Culture of Tolerance

Muhammed Ali Jinnah, Pakistan’s founding father, envisioned a predominantly Muslim, yet secular and multiethnic democratic state. Indeed, Jinnah’s struggle to achieve independence from the British Empire was a democratic one. Most South Asian historians agree that the political movement that persuaded the departing British Empire to split the Indian subcontinent into Pakistan and India was colored with religious exclusiveness, but the ultimate goal was not to establish Pakistan as a theocratic state. Jinnah believed that Pakistan, which has a 95 percent Muslim population and is the world’s second largest Muslim country, would eventually evolve into a hybrid system with a benign Sharia guiding civil law decisions on issues, such as marriage and inheritance, and a quasi-secular constitution governing all matters involving criminal law, foreign relations, public policy, and the economy. [1]

After four military dictatorships and several periods of ineffective civilian rule, religious intolerance and support for militancy has increased in Pakistan. The erosion of respect for religious pluralism in Pakistan has been abetted by exclusionary laws and the proliferation of minority-hate material in public and private school curriculums. The Pakistan Army’s support for militancy as an instrument of foreign policy has also eroded religious tolerance. [2] Religious and social discrimination against Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, Ahmadis, and Shi’ites has led to a threefold increase in religious and sectarian violence between 1980 and 2008. (See Table 1.) The rise in religious intolerance is a disturbing trend that will impede Pakistan’s development into a stable democracy and facilitate the rise of Islamist terrorism.



Background

Muhammad Ali Jinnah famously supported religious freedom in his historic speech to the constituent assembly in 1947, asking the new Pakistani citizens to feel free “to go to your temples…mosques or any other places of worship in the State of Pakistan. You may belong to any religion or caste or creed—that has nothing to do with the business of the State.” [3] However, in the years that followed independence from the British, Pakistan’s civil and criminal laws and societal norms became more intolerant of religious diversity. In addition to increasing discrimination against religious minorities, such as Christians and Sikhs, intra-religious conflicts among Sunnis, Shi’ites, and Ahmadis have also been on the rise. [4] Several major constitutional and policy milestones in Pakistani history have contributed to this backsliding on religious freedom.

Ahmadis. The Ahmadiyya Jamaat has approximately 10 million followers in the world, including approximately 3 million to 4 million in Pakistan. Toward the end of the 19th century, Mirza Ghulam Ahmad (1835-1908), founder of the Ahmadiyya Jamaat, broke with centuries-old Islamic dogma by claiming to be an Islamic prophet. (Mainstream Muslims believe that the Prophet Mohammad was the last prophet.) Six years after Pakistan’s independence, Islamists led by Anjuman-i-ahrar-i-Islam (Society of Free Muslims) started a mass movement to declare the Ahmadi sect as non-Muslim and called for the removal of Pakistani Foreign Minister Chaudhry Zafrulla Khan, an Ahmadi follower. Syed Abul Ala Mawdudi, founder of the Jamaat-i-Islami, a prominent Islamist political party, supported the movement by publishing his controversial pamphlet The Qadiani [Ahmadi] Question and book The Finality of Prophethood. [5] Both argue that Ahmadiyya was an entirely new religion that should not be associated with Islam.

Twenty years later, in 1974, President Zulfikar Ali Bhutto passed a resolution declaring Ahmadis as non-Muslims. [6] The legislation barred Ahmadis from calling themselves Muslims, calling their places of worship mosques, or worshipping in public prayer rooms open to Muslims. Ahmadis were also prohibited from performing the Muslim call to prayer, using the traditional Islamic greeting in public, or publicly quoting from the Koran.

Military dictator and Islamist-leaning Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq introduced additional legislation that fostered an atmosphere of religious intolerance and led to discrimination against religious minorities in military service, education, and the civilian bureaucracy. In 1984, Zia introduced an ordinance that added sections 298(b) and 298(c) to the Pakistani Penal Code, which made it a crime punishable by up to three years in prison for any Ahmadi to pose as a Muslim or propagate his or her religion as Islam in any forum, including in one’s own home. Two years later Zia introduced further restrictions on Ahmadis and non-Muslims by introducing the blasphemy laws under article 295(c), which stated that any person found to have disrespected the Prophet Mohammad or the Koran would face death or life imprisonment.

Over the past two decades, hundreds of Ahmadis have been convicted under the blasphemy laws. The U.S. Department of State reported that at least 25 Ahmadis were arrested on blasphemy charges in 2007. In 2002, Akbar S. Ahmed, an eminent scholar of Islam at American University, received a letter from a death-row inmate awaiting execution under the blasphemy laws. His crime was examining Mohammad’s life before he became a prophet. [7]

Christians. While Ahmadis have borne the heaviest religious persecution, Christians have also faced religious intolerance, albeit sporadically. According to the Pakistan Census Organization, 2.8 million Christians live in Pakistan, the majority in Punjab province. [8] There have been numerous incidents of violence against Christians and their worship areas. In 2002, Islamist militants attacked a Christian church in Murree, killing seven. The same year 20 worshipers were killed in a church in Taxila. [9] CLAAS, a Pakistani Christian nongovernmental organization, stated in 2002 that Christians were living under constant fear of their life and property and that their rights were either curtailed or not protected. [10] According to the Minority Rights Group International, Pakistan was among the 10 worst of 200 states in violating minority rights. The independent U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom recommended in its 2008 annual report that the U.S. State Department designate Pakistan a “country of particular concern” because of mounting concerns about religious freedom. [11]

Similar to the Ahmadis, Christians have faced legal persecution under the blasphemy laws, the Hudood Ordinance,[12] and the Qanoon-e-Shahadat (Law of Evidence). Under these laws the government has the right to regulate social behavior inside and outside the home, including intimate matters such as extramarital sex and crimes such as rape. While Muslim women also face discrimination under these laws, women from minority groups face the dual obstacles of religion and gender. In practice under the Hudood Ordinance, a non-Muslim’s testimony is not equal to a Muslim’s testimony, and two women are equal to one man in rape cases.

The 2006 Women’s Protection Bill signed by former President Musharraf marked a major milestone in rolling back discriminatory legislation by shifting cases of rape and adultery from Sharia courts to secular courts and by amending the Hudood Ordinance. Musharraf also ordered the release of 2,500 women imprisoned under the Hudood Ordinance. Some of the cases against the women will now be heard under the Women’s Protection Bill.

Musharraf’s government passed the Women’s Protection Bill with the support of his political party, the Pakistan Muslim League (Quaid-e-Azam); the Pakistan Peoples Party Parliamentarians, the party of the late Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto; and other smaller parties. The law was consistent with Musharraf’s policy of social liberalism and reversed some of Zia-ul-Haq’s Islamist laws. However, Musharraf was unable to fully repeal the Hudood Ordinance because of pressure from the religious parties. Musharraf also encouraged a burgeoning media, music, and film industry that has strengthened support for a more open and progressive society.

Parallel Legal Systems

To fully understand the anti-Ahmadi, blasphemy, and Hudood laws requires understanding Pakistan’s complex legal system. Pakistan has had three major constitutions (1956, 1962, and 1973). The current one has survived the longest, albeit with significant amendments and incidents of abeyances. Articles 20, 21, 22, 25, and 36 protect minority rights and the freedom to practice and preach all religions.

However, in the late 1970s different variations of Sharia were introduced, challenging Pakistan’s British common law. Zia-ul-Haq introduced a parallel legal system that created Sharia benches in all high courts to declare any law disrespectful of Islam as unconstitutional. In 1985, a separate electorate system was created in which non-Muslims could vote only for candidates of their own religion. President Musharraf overturned this law at the local level for some reserved seats, but non-Muslims are still barred from voting for Muslim candidates who run in the general elections. The parallel legal system also continues with a Federal Shariat Court and Sharia bench inside the Supreme Court often competing against secular courts in civil, criminal, and Islamic jurisprudence.

The Federal Shariat Court, created in 1980, has jurisdiction to challenge any decision by a secular court, a provincial legislature, or the national legislature that violates “the Injunctions of Islam as laid down in the Holy Quran and Sunnah” [13] or relates to the Hudood Ordinance and anti-blasphemy laws. This gives the Shariat Court tremendous power and leeway in interpreting laws. In practice, however, the Shariat Court has only occasionally interfered with the secular courts. One of the most famous clashes occurred in 2005 when a Lahore High Court’s decision in favor of Mukhtar Mai, a gang rape victim, was suspended by the Federal Shariat Court. [14] After strong international and national pressure from lawyers and human rights activists, the Supreme Court eventually stepped in and upheld the Lahore High Court’s decision.

On other occasions when Christians, Ahmadis, or Shi’ites are charged with defaming or disrespecting the Koran or Sunnah, the Shariat Court has stepped in and offered an opinion. For example, in 2007, the Shariat Court sentenced Younis Masih, a Pakistani Christian, to death under the anti-blasphemy laws. Masih was reportedly tortured in jail, while his lawyer survived an assassination plot. [15] The Supreme Court eventually overturned the verdict.

Pakistani Shi’ites are also not immune to the anti-blasphemy laws. In May 2007, a district judge in Karachi convicted several Shi’ites after their neighbors registered cases against them under the anti-blasphemy laws. The judge stated that he gave the judgment under death threats from Islamist clergymen waiting outside the courthouse. [16]

There is a debate over whether the Federal Shariat Court’s influence will increase as Pakistan continues to grapple with strengthening its fragile democratic institutions, including the judiciary. Created to control social, economic, and political behavior of citizens under strict Islamic law, the Shariat Court has failed to win battles against the more powerful Supreme Court. For example, it could not stop passage of the 2006 Women Protection Bill or the continuation of riba (interest) in the Pakistani banking system. The 2007 secular lawyers’ movement, which became a determining factor in President Musharraf’s political decline and eventual resignation, provided no voice to Sharia-imposing lawyers and backed Pakistan’s predominantly secular constitution.

Intrareligious Discrimination: Sunni vs. Shi’ites

Around 25 percent of Pakistan’s Muslims are Shi’ites, giving Pakistan the world’s second largest Shi’a population, after Iran. The difference between Sunnis and Shi’ites is one of interpretation and the right to lead the Muslim community. [17] Many Sunni hardliners in Pakistan would like to declare Shi’ites as non-Muslims, just as the Ahmadis. In fact, sectarianism in Pakistan has its roots in the anti-Ahmadi movement. For example, the head of Sipah-e-Sahaba-e-Pakistan (SeP, a Sunni terrorist group) began his career in the late 1970s opposing the Ahmadis. [18]

Sunni-Shia sectarian violence has claimed more than 4,000 lives since the late 1980s. [19] Retaliatory assassinations of Sunni and Shia leaders have started long-lasting blood feuds that spread across rural and urban areas of Pakistan. Growing Taliban influence in parts of the North West Frontier Province and tribal border areas is also contributing to increased sectarian violence in these regions. In Dera Ismail Khan, which borders the tribal areas, 540 Shi’ites have died in sectarian violence since 2006. Sectarian violence also erupted in the Kurram agency of the tribal border areas in 2007, killing 548 Shi’ites. The government responded with aggressive diplomacy with local tribal Sunni and Shia leaders and was able to quell the violence by mid-2008. Analysts believe incidents of sectarian violence in Pakistan are increasingly committed by Sunni militants inspired by al-Qaeda’s ideology. [20] According to a Daily Times report in 2007, an al-Qaeda operative in Peshawar killed Shia leader Syed Ali Imam Jafri.

Teaching Intolerance

While observers agree that scrapping some of Pakistan’s draconian laws, such as the blasphemy laws, will help to reduce religious intolerance, they also point to Pakistan’s education system as a major contributor to the overall problem. The U.S. State Department observes in its 2008 International Religious Freedom Report that “[t]he public school curriculum included derogatory remarks in textbooks against minority religious groups, particularly Hindus and Jews.” [21] Pakistani professor Pervez Hoodbhoy recently noted, “Pakistan’s education system demands that Islam be understood as a complete code of life, and creates in the mind of the schoolchild a sense of siege and constant embattlement by stressing Islam is under threat everywhere.” [22] Public education reform, especially curriculum reform, is essential.

The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) has requested $163 million to support Pakistan’s education sector, [23] but not for curriculum reform—a sensitive topic for any country. USAID education programs help to educate teachers, provide input on education policy reforms, improve enrollment, provide facilities in schools, and equip parents and siblings with basic literacy. Any genuine effort to reform the curriculum must come from within Pakistan.

The real engine for hate material against religious minorities comes from a wide net of radical madrassahs (Islamic religious seminaries) spread throughout Pakistan, including the cities of Karachi, Lahore, Quetta, and Islamabad and the Federally Administered Tribal Areas (FATA). Reforming the curriculum of these madrassahs must be at the center of any Pakistani effort to eradicate religious discrimination. A number of these madrassahs are financed and operated by Pakistani Islamist parties, such as the Jamaat-e-Ulema Islam (JUI), and by Pakistani expatriates and other foreign entities, including many in Saudi Arabia. [24]

Sunni Schools of Thought in Pakistan

The several Sunni schools of thought in Pakistan range across a spectrum in terms of their tolerance for other religions and varying interpretations and religious practices within Sunni Islam. An increasingly important question in Pakistan is how the government’s democratic institutions, namely the judiciary, will deal with issues that raise questions about the relationship of basic human rights to interpretations of Islamic law and religious practices. The main Sunni schools of thought include Barelvi, Deoband, and Ahl-e-Hadith.

Barelvi. The Barelvis were founded by Ahmed Raza Khan of Bareilli (1856-1921). Most Pakistanis adhere to this school of thought, which also draws from Sufi traditions. Barelvis appeal through saints and venerate graves and share a special respect and connection with shrines of Sufi saints. [25] Sufism has strong links to South Asia dating back to the eighth and ninth century and preaches religious tolerance, encourages spiritual over ritualistic practicing of Islam, and encourages diversity. Sufi shrines attract the majority of Pakistanis, but are also under constant attack from the Deobandi, Wahabi, Salafi, and Ahl-e-Hadith sects (and more recently by Taliban militants). President Asif Ali Zardari has noted the importance of Sufi shrines to Pakistani traditions of Islam and has made efforts to restore and repair them and to empower their leadership. [26]

Deoband. Deobandis are closely linked with a religiously intolerant interpretation of Islam and have established several hundred Islamic seminaries in Pakistan, many of which abet militancy. [27] This Sunni sect originated in the city of Deoband in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, where the largest Deoband madrassah still operates. Deobandism was a reformist movement that developed in reaction to British colonialism and from the belief among Muslim theologians that British influence on the Indian subcontinent was corrupting the religion of Islam. The Deobandis solidified a puritanical perspective toward Islam for South Asian Muslims, much as the Wahhabis and Salafis have done in present-day Saudi Arabia. Some Deobandi Islamic schools engage in sectarian militancy by encouraging and facilitating anti-Shia sectarian groups, such as Lashkar-e-Jhangvi (LeJ) and SeP.

On June 2, 2008, Darul Uloom, a Deoband madrassah in India, issued a fatwa (Islamic edict) against terrorism calling it “the most inhumane crime.” Pakistan political party Jamiat Ulema-e-Islam-Fazlur Rehman (JUI-F), which is ideologically linked to Darul Uloom, endorsed the fatwa. [28] Darul Uloom is one of the most important Islamic schools in the world, but has become notorious in recent years because many Pakistani extremist groups and the Taliban claim to be Deobandi adherents. Scholars of Islam have pointed out that a significant divide separates Deobandi scholars and clerics from militant groups such as the Taliban. Observers say the Taliban has oversimplified the original Deobandi teachings and note that Deobandis living in India support the secular government, while the Taliban support a violent anti-state agenda. [29]

Ahl-e-Hadith. The Ahl-e-Hadith share most of the Deobandi beliefs and trace their origins to 19th-century Bhopal (present-day India). In addition to rejecting heterodox beliefs, Ahl-e-Hadith strongly support the notion of jihad (participation in military campaigns designed to defend Muslim nations against non-Muslims). [30] Lashkar-e-Tayyiba (LeT), a Pakistan-based terrorist group responsible for the November 2008 attacks in Mumbai, subscribes to the Ahl-e-Hadith school of thought. The Ahl-e-Hadith tradition is the South Asian variant of the theological tradition motivating core al-Qaeda ideologues. [31] The Ahl-e-Hadith were represented in the most recent Pakistani national parliament (2002-2007) under an umbrella of religious parties. The Ahl-e-Hadith madrassahs emphasize the Koran and Hadith (sayings of the Prophet Muhammad) and oppose folk Islam and practices, such as celebrating the anniversaries of saints or distributing food on religious occasions. [32]

Talibanization and the Swat Valley Peace Deal

Islamabad’s decision to allow a parallel Islamic court system in the Malakand Division of the NWFP demonstrates the weakness of the Pakistan government and military against Taliban-backed extremists who seek to take over parts of the province. The government’s capitulation to the Tehrik Nifaz-i-Shariat Muhammadi (TNSM) in the Swat Valley following its campaign of violence and intimidation— which included shuttering dozens of girls’ schools,murdering women who declined to stop working, and publicly beheading accused spies—has raised concern in Washington about the Pakistani state’s ability to stop Talibanization in the province.

The recent closing of the civil courts in Swat Valley has belied the government’s earlier claim that establishing Islamic courts in the region would not usurp state authority. TNSM Chief Sufi Mohammad declared the civil courts were against Sharia and asked civil judges not to hold court. He also declared in a recent interview that democracy is not permissible under Sharia law.

The Madrassahs: Breeding Grounds for Religious Intolerance

Many of the Deoband and Ahl-e-Hadith madrassahs in Pakistan support militancy and foster a way of thinking that leads to acts of terrorism. Even madrassahs that do not openly support militancy continue to teach concepts of religious intolerance that fuel extremism. In a survey of 488 10th-grade Pakistani students in public, private, and madrassah schools, Tariq Rahman explored the propensity of madrassah curriculum toward violence. [33]

According to the survey results, madrassah students show a tendency toward sectarian and gender intolerance and a preference toward militancy to resolve contentious issues such as Kashmir. When madrassah students were asked if they supported an open war with India to solve the Kashmir matter, 60 percent responded in the affirmative. In sharp contrast, 65 percent of students in the private schools answered negatively. When asked about militancy in Kashmir, 53 percent of madrassah students supported militancy, compared to only 22 percent of private school students. The results were similar in the categories of sectarian, gender, and religious tolerance. This study demonstrates a broad-based connection between madrassah education and the propensity toward gender, religious, and sectarian intolerance and militant violence.

A study by Saleem Ali supports Tariq Rahman’s survey in making a connection between madrassahs and religious militancy. Ali concentrated his work on Ahmedpur, a rural area in east Punjab province with a substantial concentration of madrassahs and a history of sectarian violence. According to Ali, Ahmedpur is the birthplace of Harkat-ul-Ansar and Jaish-e-Mohammad, which are Deoband Kashmir-focused, Sunni sectarian terrorist organizations that have targeted Westerners. Ahmedpur has 363 madrassahs, of which 98 percent are Sunni and more than 50 percent are Deobandi. Only 11 percent are registered with the federal government. [34] Ali calculated that more than half were actively involved in sectarian militancy.

These two studies identify strong links between interreligious and intrareligious violence. While madrassah reform is essential, broad-based interfaith harmony initiatives by the Pakistani government can also help to create an environment that will facilitate reforms. A good example is the Pakistani government’s backing of the Allama Inayat Ali Shakir’s organization, Tehrik-e-Akhuwat-e-Islami (Movement for the Brotherhood of Islam), which conducts seminars, conferences, and workshops on interfaith cooperation. The organization has recently worked with the Council of Islamic Ideology and religious parties toward a joint declaration against religious discrimination and using religion to justify terrorism.

Policy Recommendations

Reversing the trends toward religious intolerance and extremism in Pakistan will take strong leadership and commitment from both the military establishment and civilian politicians. The military’s support for religious extremists to achieve its foreign policy objectives vis-à-vis Afghanistan and India has had far-reaching negative consequences for Pakistani society and the country’s stability. Continued links between Islamist extremists and retired military and intelligence officials has led to confusion within the security establishment about the genuine threat to the nation’s future.

In turn, the security establishment’s ambivalence toward extremist groups fuels conspiracy theories against outsiders (mainly India or the U.S.), which are aired in the Pakistani media and lead to a public discourse that plays down the terrorist threat. To survive as a unified and stable institution, the Pakistan Army needs to fully break its links with extremist groups and rein in individuals who are pressing an Islamist agenda.

In the current environment of Islamist terrorism, Pakistani secular politicians are often powerless to bring change for fear of violent retaliation. The assassination of former Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on December 27, 2007, is a stark example of the dangerous forces currently at play in Pakistan. The NWFP government’s capitulation to the pro-Taliban forces in the Swat Valley is another example of the violent intimidation of secular forces in the country. Prior to the Swat Valley agreement, several Awami National Party politicians, including party leader Asfandyar Wali Khan, were targeted for assassination.

Until the security situation improves in Pakistan, politicians and civil society leaders will have difficulty making bold policy moves to increase religious tolerance and freedom. However, civilians can begin to effect change at the grassroots level through smaller-scale initiatives. The U.S. should support local leaders seeking to promote religious pluralism and find ways to program more aid toward such endeavors.

In this environment, the U.S. should:

• Support development of civil society and democratic institutions. The U.S. should strongly support the development of Pakistan’s democratic institutions, including the parliament, judiciary, and free press. Steps to increase non-military aid to Pakistan are welcome and will contribute to strengthening civil society and civil institutions, which should facilitate freer discourse on issues of religious freedom and pluralism. The lawyers’ movement has attuned the Pakistani people to the importance of a free judiciary as a cornerstone of democracy. Pakistanis’ excitement for establishing a freer and stronger judiciary should also catalyze discussions on individual liberty and religious freedom. The U.S. appears to have played the role of honest broker in encouraging the Zardari government to reinstate the country’s top justice, thereby defusing a public confrontation between the government and opposition led by Nawaz Sharif. It is crucial that the U.S. continue to deemphasize relationships with individual Pakistani leaders and instead consistently support the development of Pakistani democratic institutions.
• Support Pakistani efforts to form a public-private education watchdog agency. Religious intolerance declines when a community nurtures a culture of tolerance. While laws, civil society organizations, and a break from discriminatory practices and traditions is significant, any long-term impact on religious tolerance in Pakistan will require changing the curriculum of public and private schools, especially the madrassahs. The system of federal, provincial, and local boards of education that manages and implements curriculums in public schools, colleges, and universities — including the federal board for madrassahs—lacks the resources, coordination, accountability, and clear guidance to implement a liberal, yet culturally sensitive educational philosophy. With U.S. support, Pakistan could create an independent nonpartisan public-private education watchdog agency to monitor public education. The agency could coordinate federal, provincial, and local efforts to purge religious and ethnic hate material from the national curriculum.
• Support nongovernmental efforts to promote religious tolerance and pluralism. U.S. officials should recognize and support important work by nongovernmental organizations in promoting religious pluralism. For example, the LibforAll Foundation has done groundbreaking work in Indonesia by building networks among educators, religious leaders, celebrities, and opinion leaders in promoting religious pluralism. This approach could also be applied in Pakistan. The U.S.-based International Center for Religion and Diplomacy has been conducting a Madrassah Enhancement Program, which encourages Pakistani madrassahs to expand their curriculum to include the social and scientific disciplines, with an emphasis on religious tolerance and human rights. It also seeks to motivate madrassah leaders to use religious principles in peacefully resolving conflict.
• Speak out against cases of religious persecution and repression and oppose punishment for religion-related offenses, such as apostasy or blasphemy. In 2005, the international attention on the case of Mukhtar Mai, a Pakistani woman who was gang-raped as part of an honor settlement for a tribal dispute, likely contributed to the Musharraf government’s decision to pass the Women’s Protection Bill of 2006. Raising the profile of cases involving religious intolerance and persecution in Pakistan can spotlight policy and legal deficiencies in the system that contribute to religious intolerance. U.S. officials should not shy away from raising public concern over cases of religious intolerance or persecution as a matter of principle.
• Integrate policies promoting religious tolerance into Pakistan’s counterinsurgency policy. In the past two years, sectarian violence fanned by Taliban and Sunni extremist groups linked to al-Qaeda has increased in Pakistan’s northwest, notably in the Kurram agency and Dera Ismail Khan and Tank districts. Through aggressive diplomacy and brute force, the Pakistani military has brokered temporary ceasefires, but sustainable peace depends on implementing a long-term multifaceted counterinsurgency campaign. The clear, hold, and build school of counterinsurgency advocates a three-step policy of winning the population over by providing security (clearing), managing governance (holding), and creating socioeconomic opportunities (building). After succeeding on the first two steps, the Pakistani military also needs to push education reform to fight religious intolerance in Pakistan’s northwest and to reduce future terrorist recruitment.
  

Conclusion

One of the most important ways to fight Islamist extremism is to demonstrate the importance of respect for other religious traditions and the benefits to society of developing a culture of religious freedom and pluralism. The Pakistani people have a deep culture of pluralist traditions dating back centuries, which their founding leader sought to preserve in order to strengthen Pakistan as a nation-state, while maintaining the country’s Muslim identity. Pakistanis need to nurture this pluralist, tolerant tradition in order to stabilize and develop the country as it faces extremists that wish to destroy Pakistan’s South Asian identity, retard overall growth and development, and isolate the country from the global community.

Lisa Curtis is Senior Research Fellow for South Asia in the Asian Studies Center at The Heritage Foundation. Haider A. H. Mullick is Senior Fellow at the U.S. Joint Special Operations University and Research Associate at Pakistan Security Research Unit, University of Bradford.
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[1]Pakistan is an Islamic republic. Islam is the state religion, and its constitution requires that laws be consistent with Islam.

[2]Pervez Amirali Hoodbhoy, "Towards Theocracy?" Frontline, March 14–27, 2009, at http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2606/stories/20090327260601600.htm (April 27, 2009).

[3]See Muhammad Ali Jinnah, address to the Constituent Assembly of Pakistan, August 11, 1947, at http://www.pakistani.org/pakistan/legislation/
constituent_address_11aug1947.html (April 27, 2009).

[4]According to Freedom House's Freedom in the World 2007, Pakistan had a score of 6 on a scale of 1 to 10 with 1 being the highest level and 10 being the lowest level of religious freedom in the world. Freedom House, Freedom in the World 2007, s.v. "Pakistan," at http://www.freedomhouse.org/template.cfm?
page=22&country=7247&year=2007 (April 27, 2009).

[5]Ibid.

[6]Constitution of Pakistan, Art. 260, at http://www.pakistani.org/pakistan/constitution (April 27, 2009).

[7]Akbar S. Ahmed, "Pakistan's Blasphemy Law: Words Fail Me," The Washington Post, May 19, 2002, p. B1, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/ac2/wp-dy
n/A36108-2002May17 (April 27, 2009).

[8]Shaun Gregory, "The Christian Minority in Pakistan: Issues and Options," University of Bradford (U.K.), Pakistan Security Research Unit Brief No. 37, July 17, 2008, p. 4, at http://spaces.brad.ac.uk:8080/download/attachments/748/ Brief+37.pdf (April 27, 2009).

[9]Azaz Syed, "56 Suicide Attacks Occurred Since 2002," The Daily Times (India), October 22, 2007, at http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=200
7\10\22\story_22-10-2007_pg7_24 (April 27, 2009).

[10]Nasir Saeed, "Faith Under Fire," CLAAS-UK, 2002, p. 17, quoted in Gregory, "The Christian Minority in Pakistan," p. 13.

[11]U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, Annual Report 2008, May 2008, pp. 7 and 146–153, at http://www.uscirf.gov/images/AR2008/ann
ual%20report%202008-final%20edition.pdf (April 29, 2009).

[12]The Hudood Ordinance was enacted under General Zia-ul-Haq's martial law regime in 1979 to legislate the moral behavior of citizens—such as extramarital sex, rape, theft, and prohibition of alcohol—under strict Islamic law. For an authoritative study, see Katherine M. Weaver, "Women's Rights and Sharia Law: A Workable Reality? An Examination of Possible International Human Rights Approaches Through the Continuing Reform of the Pakistani Hudood Ordinance," Duke Journal of Comparative and International Law, Vol. 48, No. 2 (Spring 2007), p. 483,at http://www.law.duke.edu/shell/cite.pl?17+Duke+J.+Comp.+&
+Int%27l+L.+483 (April 27, 2009).

[13]Constitution of Pakistan, Art. 227 (1).

[14]"Shariat Court on Mai Case: Defense Counsel Criticizes Decision," The Daily Times, March 13, 2005, at http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=story_
13-3-2005_pg7_27 (April 27, 2009).

[15]Amnesty International, "Pakistan: Further Information on Death Threats/Fear for Safety/Possible Death Penalty/Prisoner of Conscience. New Concern: Death Penalty," June 18, 2007, at http://www.amnesty.org/en/library
/info/ASA33/012/2007/en (April 27, 2009).

[16]Editorial, "‘Islamic' Laws Gone Wrong," The Daily Times, May 29, 2007, at http://www.dailytimes.com.pk/default.asp?page=2007\05\29\story_2
9-5-2007_pg3_1 (April 27, 2009).

[17]In early Islamic history, the Shi'ites were a political faction that supported the power of Ali, son-in-law of the Prophet Muhammed and the fourth Caliph (spiritual ruler) of the Muslim community. Ali was murdered in 661 AD and replaced by his chief opponent, Muawiya, leading to the schism between Sunnis and Shi'ites.

[18]Muhammad Qasim Zaman, "Sectarianism in Pakistan: The Radicalization of Shiia and Sunni Identities," Modern Asian Studies, Vol. 32, Issue 3 (July 1998), p. 642.

[19]Human Rights Commission of Pakistan, State of Human Rights in 2007, p. 105, at http://www.hrcp-web.org/hrcpDetail_pub3.cfm?proId=528 (April 27, 2009).

[20]Alastair Lawson, "Pakistan's Evolving Sectarian Schism," BBC News, February 20, 2009, at http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/7901094.stm (April 27, 2009).

[21]U.S. Department of State, 2008 Report on International Religious Freedom, s.v. Pakistan, September 2008, at http://www.state.gov/g/drl/rls/irf/2008/108505.htm (April 29, 2009).

[22]Hoodbhoy, "Towards Theocracy?"

[23]U.S. Department of State, Congressional Budget Justification: Foreign Operations, Fiscal Year 2009, p. 588, at http://www.usaid.gov/policy/budget/cbj2009/101468.pdf (April 29, 2009).

[24]K. Alan Kronstadt, "Education Reform in Pakistan," Congressional Research Service Report for Congress, December 23, 2004, at http://fpc.state.gov/documents/organization/40145.pdf (April 28, 2009).

[25]See Christine C. Fair, The Madrassah Challenge: Militancy and Religious Education in Pakistan (Washington, D.C.: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2008).

[26]Amar Guriro, "Skeletons in Cupboard," The Daily Times, November 25, 2008.

[27]See S. M. Khalid, Deeni madaaris main taleem (Education in religious schools) (Islamabad: Institute of Policy Studies, 2002).

[28]Zakir Hussnain, "JUI-F Endorses Indian Madrassa Fatwa," The Daily Times, June 5, 2008.

[29]Muhammad Qasim Zaman, The Ulama in Contemporary Islam: Custodians of Change (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 2002), pp. 139–140.

[30]The term "jihad" can also apply to a Muslim's inner struggle against his/her own immoral desires.

[31]C. Christine Fair, "Antecedents and Implications of the November 2008 Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) Attack upon Several Targets in the Indian Mega-City of Mumbai," testimony before the Subcommittee on Transportation Security and Infrastructure Protection, Committee on Homeland Security, U.S. House of Representatives, March 11, 2009, at http://homeland.house.gov/SiteDocuments/
20090311141119-80354.pdf (April 27, 2009).

[32]Lisa Curtis, "U.S. Aid to Pakistan: Countering Extremism Through Education Reform," Heritage Foundation Lecture No. 1029, June 8, 2007, at http://www.heritage.org/Research/AsiaandthePacific/hl1029.cfm.

[33]Tariq Rahman, "Pluralism and Intolerance in Pakistani Society: Attitudes of Pakistani Students Towards the Religious ‘Other,'" 2007, p. 29, at http://www.tariqrahman.net/language/Pluralism%20and%20Intolerance%20
in%20Pakistani%20Society.htm (April 30, 2009).

[34]Saleem H. Ali, "Islamic Education and Conflict: Understanding the Madrassahs of Pakistan," unpublished working draft, University of Vermont, retrieved December 14, 2007, p. 69.

URL: http://www.heritage.org/Research/AsiaandthePacific/bg2268.cfm

Ahmadis held without any evidence of blasphemy

--- HRCP

Press Releases

Ahmadis held without any evidence of blasphemy

Press Release, February 12, 2009

LAHORE: Five Ahmadis detained on charges of blasphemy in Layyah district have been held without virtually any proof or witnesses, the Human Rights Commission (HRCP) said on Thursday.

The commission, which had sent a fact-finding team to Layyah district last week, said its findings concluded that an investigation, mandated by law prior to the registration of a blasphemy case, was also not held.

The HRCP team learned that a prayer leader in the village had allowed Ahmadi students from a nearby tuition centre to offer prayers in his mosque. The students were later threatened by a government schoolteacher and never went to the mosque again. Around 10 days later, some villagers claimed finding blasphemous writings in the mosque’s toilet.

In the First Information Report (FIR), the complainant said: “Since these Ahmadis are the only non-Muslims coming to the mosque, therefore they must have committed the offence.” The ‘argument’ was heard time and again during the HRCP team’s interviews with the mosque administration, some villagers and the local police.

The police and villagers conceded that there were no witnesses or evidence of the Ahmadis’ involvement. The HRCP team found elements belonging to banned extremist organizations and a relative of the National Assembly member from the area had pressurised the police to register a case. “It is clear that a local politician has also used his influence” to book the Ahmadis, the commission’s report said.

HRCP said the complainant and his extremist supporters are adamant that the Ahmadis should be punished on the basis of presumption.

HRCP has demanded a prompt and transparent investigation into the matter to ensure that innocent people are not victimised. It has also demanded the government must ensure that the Ahmadiyya community in the village is not harassed or ostracized. The Commission has also asked the government to take prompt measures to rule out misuse of the blasphemy law.

The detailed fact-finding report can be accessed at the HRCP website: http://www.hrcp-web.org/

Asma Jahangir
Chairperson

URL: www.hrcp-web.org/print.cfm?proId=685